The Mexican herder working for Bent uneasily watched them as they rode up to his makeshift lean-to and demanded a change of horses, a report of his stewardship, and the use of his fire. They were not bad fellows and were generous with their heavenly tobacco, and finally his uneasiness wore away and he gossiped with them while the night more and more shut in his lavish fire and seemed to soften the guttural polyglot of the two Indians. The white men did most of the talking, as was usual, and could make themselves understood in the herder's bastard Spanish and they answered sociably his numerous questions. Had they heard of the great _Tejano_ army marching to avenge the terrible defeat inflicted by the brave Armijo on their swaggering vanguard? It was the great subject from the upper end of the Valley of Taos to the last settlement along the Rio Grande and the Pecos. The ignoble dogs of _Tejanos_ had basely murdered the brave Mexican scouting party near the Cimarron Crossing of the Arkansas. What could the _soldats_ of Mexico do, attacked in their sleep? Most of the murdered _soldats_ had come from the Valley of Taos, which always had been friendly to Texas. Was it true that the _Tejanos_ spit fire on dry nights and could kill a full-grown bull buffalo with their bare hands? Ah, they were devils and the sons of devils, those _Tejanos_; and at night all doors were tightly barred in the settlements and strange Americans regarded with suspicion. Some nights later, down the rough, steep sides of the Arroyo Hondo, through which trickled a ribbon of water from a recent rain, four Indians rode carefully, leading two pack animals. They were two Arapahoes, a Blackfoot, and a Delaware, and they followed the ravine and soon came in sight of the little mountain pasture, dotted with cedar bushes and sparsely covered with grass, which sloped gently down the mountain side. In the fading twilight the so-called ranch stood vaguely outlined, the nature of its log and adobe walls indiscernible, its mill and the still house looming vaguely over the main building against the darker background of the slope. The faint smell of sour mash almost hid the mealy odor of the grist mill; hogs grunted in the little corral by the fenced-in garden, while an occasional bleating of sheep came from the same enclosure. Dark shapes moved over the cedar-brush pasture and the frequent stamping of hoofs told they were either horses or mules. High up near the roof of the composite building were narrow oblongs of faint radiance, where feeble candle light shone through the little squares of gypsum, so much used in that country in place of window glass. As the four newcomers smilingly looked at the comfortable building the foot-compelling strains of a cheap violin squeaked and rasped resinously from the living quarters and a French-Canadian, far from home, burst ecstatically into song. Dreaming chickens cackled briefly and a sleepy rooster complained in restrained indignation, while